I gave my local a chance to earn my business. They failed, so I bought at one of the other 10 Toyota dealers within the local commuting distance. I take it to my local to have serviced and have never had an issue.

Unless you are an a$$hole, I'm guessing your experience will be no different. But if you are into burning bridges and being a prck, the I suppose you'll get well deserve treatment by the dealership staff that does not get paid to put up with customer's sht. Bees with honey, man.

Good luck.

 

It sounds like to me you are all of that above? i would certainly not deal with you!

 

I once had a car driven up from 200miles away. Warranty began with mileage on odometer when I took possession.

Yes, it can be this frustrating especially when you want a second row bench seat in the Limited trim line. I ended up with my second choice exterior color and paid a bit more than I would have for a different trim model, but I wanted a second row bench, period. I wanted certain features I was willing to pay for. And that was after waiting months for the 2018s to go into production because none of the '17s that were left, when I started looking, had the colors I wanted.

Seems $200 just to search might be a rip off, but what do I know?

 

The model/trim/colors that I wanted was not in inventory at the local dealer, but they found one at another dealer about 100+ miles away. It was there the very next day, no additional fees.

I would forget about buying from that dealership, and go get what you want from someone who wants to sell it to you.

I have absolutely no problem driving 100-300 miles to purchase a vehicle if I can save a significant amount of money, and/or the local dealer is not willing to match the price, or at least come close enough to where the trip would not be worth it. If driving out of town will save me a significant amount of money, I will make the trip.

Most dealers will go ahead and match the price if they know you are serious about buying elsewhere, but you gotta be a shrewd, but polite, negotiator.

Remember, this is a major purchase. You are 100% in control of the deal, and there is absolutely no reason to not get EXACTLY what you want!

 

A dealership charged you to search for the vehicle you wanted? That's just bogus from the start. Mine isn't a Toyota story (it's Acura) but a local dealer didn't have the specific vehicle my wife and I wanted so the salesman said "I'll find you one". Next day we got a call, the vehicle we wanted was 300 miles away and was being put on a hauler. One more day and we had our car no muss, no fuss, no haggle. The same should have been true for you. There are undoubtedly dealer networks set up specifically to look for inventory. Toyota certainly knows where it has sent product.


If I were you I'd abandon your local dealership (get your $200 back) and do your own search. Try using Toyota's 'build your vehicle' site to search out as far as you want. Be sure to check your own local/state tax codes to be sure you won't pay another state sales tax plus your own. Also DMV rules. Example, California requires 7500 miles on the odometer before a vehicle can be registered in the state specifically to prevent people from buying elsewhere (circumventing Ca smog rules).

Your local dealer will service your vehicle whether you purchased there or not. Check out this Jalopnik article on that subject.

Cheers!

 

I use a buying service like Costco and search in a market where Toyota dealerships are known to be price competitive several hours away. It helps get all the details in writing with some accountability so that you don't get stuck with a "take it or leave it" once you are on the lot.

 

What a rip for charging for the search. I ordered my 2017 Limited. No hassels to do it and it was about 10 weeks for delivery. The dealer made it work despite any "allocations" claims.

 

Yup Ive used Costco..No problems.. The 2017 I have... Was from my local dealer... I went in and wanted black with Saddle inside ..there was only one..It was in Iowa.. they took a hauler to Iowa and picked it up and brought it back.. i was charged NOTHING to try to find it.. Thats crap..

 

That's my color scheme. Love it!

 

Thanks for the reply.....my nearest other Toyota dealership is 90 miles away in my state, 75 miles away in Illinois. Thats why im trying to deal with my local one, but im getting very frustrated at this point. They build them at a factory in Princeton Indiana which is 100 mile south of me...i wish i could just drive there and pick one up. The dealership told me the next Platinum model i want isnt scheduled to be built until 11-26 of this month....sounds like a big pile of Bull$hit to me..you'd think they maybe wanted to sell them. Im thinking otherwise. When you are ready to spend $45,000+ for a vehicle, id think they should be kissing me on my cheek and whispering sweet nothings in my ear for my buisiness...guess not !!

 

The dealership told me the next Platinum model i want isnt scheduled to be built until 11-26 of this month....sounds like a big pile of Bull$hit to me..you'd think they maybe wanted to sell them.

That's only a 3 week wait, nothing out of line with that. TMMI runs that assembly plant close to full capacity, like 6 days/week & 2 shifts, and there's really no huge inventory of Highlanders. You don't see Toyota giving 5 or 6 yr no interest deals or $1000 to $2000 off list price from the factory on a Highlander. As far as a dealer charging $200 just to locate a car, better go find a different dealer. Years ago, I used to fly into Detroit, get a cab ride to Ford Motor Co's Wixom, Mich assembly plant to pickup new Lincoln's and drive it back to Iowa City, and that was close to 500 miles, just a start to the cars break-in. Dealers trade new cars all the time and put 100-200 miles on them. My old 2010 Venza came from ILL, better half's old '09 Corolla "S" came from Ashland. NE, our current HL came from Peoria, all dealer trades.

 

We do not have any Costco stores in our area..... id get my $200 back, but they told me it was Non-Refundable...go figure, why not....im just getting very tired of hearing that no one from the other dealerships in St. Louis or Chicago will get back with them....that doesnt even sound possible. They are telling us the whole issue is us wanting one with a 2nd row bench seat....they said they can locate a bunch with the captains chairs, but its not what we want...i think we are about ready to just say screw it and look at Nissans, Hyundais or Kia's instead.

 

They are telling us the whole issue is us wanting one with a 2nd row bench seat....they said they can locate a bunch with the captains chairs, but its not what we want....

That I can believe based on my own search experience, which was that second row bench is easy to find in the XLE, difficult in the Ltd, and even more difficult in Ltd Platinum. . . in the colors I wanted.

Try doing your own search, including out of state, by putting in different zip codes on the Toyota website search function. Or just Google something like "Toyota dealers in Atlanta", where there are a handful of dealers all competing for the sale.

 

I think you should walk away and consider the $200 a cheap learning experience from this dealership. Your right there are other brands that can offer you not exactly what a Highlander is, but very nice vehicles. If this is a indication of how this dealer ship operates consider it a blessing to find out now instead of thousands of dollars later.

 

I agree with the above.

Spending that kind of money, you should get what you want and the dealer should make you feel good about it. Obviously, these guys either do not care or are just inept as sales people, and would not get my business. I would stay the H*ll away and never go back, even for service.

As for buying, I would go to a multi dealer large metro area (like Denver) and shop around. Costco is a good start, and bid down from there. You should be able to get what you want, especially if you are willing to wait. Also you should be able to get a good price. Competition is good.

I personally prefer to have the car located and pick it up from the dealer location. I do not want someone else driving it. You should not have to pay for that.

 

Trying to order a Toyota vehicle the exact way you want it is a lot harder than it really needs to be. The root cause is a distribution model that dates back decades, when Toyota first came to North America and contracted out the distribution chain to a bunch of other companies. The U.S. is still cut into 13 regions. Even though Toyota has finally taken back control of 11 of the 13 regions (the two independents are Gulf States and Southeast), the old processes are still in place and the dealers have to work their inventory and orders through their regional office.

Each Toyota dealer has "allocations", or slots for x number of each model per month. Unless the dealer has a specific request, the distributor determines which color and option combinations are going to sit on the lots, and places factory orders and fills allocation slots that way. That's why you often see the same build configurations at multiple dealers in your area. If a dealer has a request, then of course it uses one of their allocations. If that request is for something that isn't already in the manufacturing pipeline, then it takes that much longer to fill the allocation with a vehicle and sell it because the factory has to schedule it.

You'd think that with today's modern manufacturing processes with exact build planning/scheduling, there would be much better communication between the dealer, distributor, and ultimately the customer. But for some reason, that's not the case.

So anyway, all of that is why most Toyota dealers hate to order anything. If you can find a dealer that's willing to work with you, not take your money shamelessly (agree - that "search fee" is totally absurd), and will wait with you for the vehicle you want to be manufactured, then you're doing well. Many Toyota dealers would rather wait for the car you want to magically appear at another dealer in the region - sometimes for months - than go through the process of requesting a special vehicle from the distributor. The only logic I can find in that is that they're not willing to spend their employees' time on something like that, and/or it will prevent them from potentially selling another car sooner because you're taking up one of their allocation slots.

I've had to order my last two Tacomas because I couldn't find what I wanted on a lot. The first time, the process wasn't bad aside from the waiting of course. Most recently, the dealer (the same dealer as the first one) almost tanked the deal by playing games, although fortunately they didn't play games for long and ultimately placed the order with the distributor.

I'm a bit disappointed to hear that they would have driven the new car to you from the other dealer, but I'm not surprised. That dealer I just wrote about also mentioned the idea of driving the truck from far away if they could find it. If I want to order a new car, I want it with nearly 0 miles - I don't want for them to put 300 miles on it just getting it here! Sounds like that's a thing now too, where they won't use a transport truck to move cars from one dealer to another.

I don't have much loyalty to any one Toyota dealer in my area - I go where the car I want is on the lot. That does make life a lot easier when possible, as then you don't have to play these games about ordering or moving cars around. Like others have said, any dealer will still service the car even though you bought it somewhere else.

It's too bad you ran into this mess with your first new car purchase. It's really not supposed to be this hard!

 

I tried Costco. Didn't help at all. Luckily local Toyota dealer found what we wanted and had it for us the next day at the price we wanted. We were lucky to get the trim/model/colors we would happy with. Not easy to find. Most everything had black interior which we did not want and made no sense in our Texas heat.

 

I was in your boat in March 2018.. Wanted a white Ltd Plat, black interior, bench second row... good luck. Limited and Platinum bench second rows are hard to find(especially in a specific color combo). I would not be paying any dealer a penny to locate me one. I had one try I said see you later. Got mine on a dealer trade, had 200 miles on it when I took delivery but it was the only one within 500 miles and I didn't feel like factory ordering one. It was frustrating trying to find one myself cause most dealers didn't list whether it was capt chairs or bench so you had to rely on whether they posted interior pics and see on those most of the time. PIA. Good luck.

Ps. funniest part of my experience was the dealers responding with " you can't get a platinum with a bench second row".. they also lost chances at my business for being clueless of what they sell..

 

It was frustrating trying to find one myself cause most dealers didn't list whether it was capt chairs or bench so you had to rely on whether they posted interior pics and see on those most of the time.

Or the listing online has the wrong 2nd row description. And then, sometimes dealers have the wrong interior pics.:facepalm:

 

I purchased my 2018 Limited a couple of months ago; it has a 2nd row bench seat, AWD, black interior, Predawn Gray Mica - all of which I spec'd (I was willing to compromise on color though). It took the dealer an hour or so to locate one in SoCal (apparently there were only two in the Western USA). They had it delivered and ready for me to pick up the next day, and they loaned me a used Highlander to drive overnight - all at no charge.

 

I'd never pay $200 or even $2 for them to do a search. That's absurd. They can easily get that information with about 5 minutes of work.


Finding a hot selling vehicle in a specific color and options is always a challenge. That's why I really don't care what color it is as long as it's NOT White or Black. Almost any other color is fine with me. I'm just not that picky.

 

I also went through similar situation car 200 miles away they offered to drive it in-- but I thought the first 1000 miles important break in and was worried driver would be doing 75 mph all the way asked for flatbed they wanted $500 turned it down-- found another vehicle with another dealer and they would flatbed it no cost--

 

I appreciate all the people who claimed to know how dealership work. The fact is that if you have never worked as a salesperson at a dealership you really have no idea. I have been in sale with Toyota for 18 yrs. This is not to bash anyone but merely to educate how most Toyota dealer works. Even when you go to Toyota.com and build a specific vehicle, its going to try to match the closest vehicle to you. Dealership earns vehicle by selling those vehicle faster (turn and earn). Some big cities that have multiple dealerships may or may not agreed to do dealer trade with each other due to the conflict of same customer. So they have to go farther out to other districts to do dealer trade with other dealers. There are a lot of cost involved in dealer trade with back end money that Toyota give so trading in a particular car the selling dealer want put the other dealer that has the right car at an advantage to either allow a trade and they can choose another vehicle from the selling dealer's present or future inventories similar to trading player in sport (no kidding..its true). We have specific employee that do only dealer trade. They play with inventories, switch them, they know what sells fast, whats hot and what get the most money from Toyota. So its more than just trying to please a customer. The thought of dealershop don't want to sell you a vehicle is absurd. Customers don't care about what is going on behind the scene. Getting a vehicle to the dealer after the trade mostly done by hiring old timer to drive them back and forth. That also cost money. If you are patience, dealer can do sea stock trade (trade of future vehicles that are assigned to dealer) so those vehicle would be shipped on truck right to the dealer so no miles. Profit margin are thin and every dealer wants to sell you a vehicle if they can. If you want competitive pricing, forget small dealers. Go to large volume dealers....we can take more loss on front price but have more chance to make it up due to sheer volume. Think Casinos. Toyota build similar equipped vehicle for the mass. If you want a different type of equipment...like the Platinum with bench seats, it is less likely than one that is bucket seat. 90% buyers of Limited Platinum want bucket seats. Dealer can "order" your vehicle but will take a long time so be patience. Hope this open an insight into why it is not as easy as we all want it to be.

 

As customers, we'd love to be more educated - and involved - in how the process works. Trust me, we do care. We're spending a LOT of money on cars now, and those of us who are looking for a very specific vehicle (color, options) want what we want.

What I don't understand is that when I'm willing to be patient to get exactly what I want and wait for the factory to build one and send it directly to the dealer, the dealer doesn't want to do that. It doesn't surprise me at all to hear that trading cars with other dealers is time-consuming and costly. So why are dealers so reluctant to order a new vehicle from the factory if that's what the customer wants?!? In both my own experience and post after post on the Internet, it appears that they'd rather play that trading game, so something about factory special orders must be even worse. Does it just boil down to "turn and earn", and a factory order ties up an allocation slot for too long, or is there more to it?

It's not absurd at all to say a dealer doesn't want to sell you a vehicle, but we say that knowing that the main reason that happens is because the dealer won't make enough money on the transaction to make it worth their while. As consumers, we don't want to spend more than we have to, but we also understand that dealers are businesses and they have to make money to keep going. That said, some dealers will take less profit than others on an individual transaction, and it makes sense that it's the bigger dealers that have a little more freedom there since they can make more money through sales volume. So there will be situations where a small dealer won't make a deal that a bigger dealer would.

 

... What I don't understand is that when I'm willing to be patient to get exactly what I want and wait for the factory to build one and send it directly to the dealer, the dealer doesn't want to do that. ...

1. They want the revenue NOW, not 3 months from now.
2. You can still walk away from the deal while the vehicle is being built (although the customer will forfeit their deposit).
3. If there's a trade-in involved, the trade-in will most likely have to be reappraised when the new vehicle is delivered and the deal is being finalized - if anything has happened to the trade-in that lessens its value, then that can cause a lot of grief for both sides.
4. They don't want to deal with tracking the order and dealing with customer questions about the order status.

And I'm sure there are more reasons...

 

It took our dealer around 5 months to find the exact configuration of 2017 Highlander Hybrid XLE in one of the colors I wanted (any of Blue, Green, Red, or Silver). We weren't in a huge rush to get it so I didn't really push hard, but I do know that he was actively looking from January through May of that year, and he just couldn't get his hands on anything.

The waiting is annoying, but hardly surprising given the popularity of the model.

 

I just wanted to say THANK YOU to EVERYONE who took the time to respond to my post..the newest info i now have is that the dealerships in Chicago and St. Louis will NOT respond to my local dealers request to do a trade or whatever to get a Highlander that i wanting. Now we are at a "We've found one that has been allocated to another dealership about 100 miles away"...But that vehicle isn't scheduled to even be built until the end of the month, and then they are guessing around the middle of Dec that we might get it...
So only time will tell on how this all ends up playing out.
Again ...a BIG THANKS TO EVERYONE...The overwhelming information and personal experiences were amazing !!

 

They are not responding to your dealer because he has either burnt some bridges with them in the past or he has nothing they are interested in in return. Much easier to tell a customer the other dealers won’t respond than to tell them the truth is that the other dealer just isn’t interested in doing business with them.


That’s really not too long of a wait for the exact specs you want. Enjoy

 

Custom Ordering

I, like you, wanted a very specific configuration. I went to my local dealer and ended up walking out on them due to pricing and lack of effort toward giving me what I wanted.

What I finally did, was go through Consumer Reports car buying service which uses TrueCar. I picked my vehicle (2019 HL Hybrid Limited Platinum), then I picked EVERY option that I wanted and was quoted a price and several dealerships to pick from in the Chicago area. I made an appointment with one about 12 miles away, showed up at the scheduled time, and everything was done within about an hour...AND the price was better than quoted. I saved over $2000 over what the local dealer offered.


Admittedly, having to wait 60(ish) days is a pain, but I am getting EVERYTHING I wanted, No compromises on color, navigation options, seat configuration, etc. The ordering means you have to wait for the car to be manufactured, then another few weeks until delivery, but you get EXACTLY what you want


For me, it is worth it. I am looking forward to my new vehicle around the end of this month. So far, I have received both text messages and phone calls twice a week to keep me updated on the progress and to answer any questions that may arise. Love it!!

 

My local dealer was smart in my search. I didn't even commit to a dealer trade but he found the only one in the specs I wanted(2 hours away at a dealer I used to live 5 min away from and dealt with before. I also was eyeing it up on their website) and next thing you know it disappeared off that dealers website(I didn't think local dealer would have went to get it without a deal yet). I just assumed it sold. A couple days later it was on my local dealers website for sale.. So needless to say they got my business lol.. I was glad to not have to deal with a 2 hour trade/deal on new vehicle situation..

 

The Costco car buying and travel service are over-rated. Maybe not in a big city with multiple same brand dealer ships but if you have 1 dealer in a 50-100 mile radius they will sell the car to you for the same price as would through Costco or you walking in direct. Book a hotel tthru Costco or direct no difference.
Last time I ordered a car (instead of buying of the lot) I got exactly what I wanted but had to wait for my Mini Cooper 12 weeks but that of course included the transit time from over-seas. The fun part was that we had the order number and could follow the car exactly where it was in the process. being it the paint line, the assembly line, or the parking lot at the shipping terminal.
I did order a car once from the dealer that had to come in from another dealer and was shocked about the color as it was completely different than the brochure showed. Almost didn't accept it.
Order the car you want exactly like you want from the dealer that is farther away after you explain to that dealer that you wanted to buy from your local dealer but they wouldn't meet your requirements. 3 to 4 weeks is not that long of a wait to get the exact car for $45K plus that you want.
The other dealer will be happy to sell you the car as they don't have to go through trying to sell you a car.
Walk away from your current dealer's sales department and and be assured that the service department is happy to meet all service and warranty requirements as they are not the same entity.

 

Dealership earns vehicle by selling those vehicle faster (turn and earn).

The MAIN reason dealers make more money on inventory is because most (vast majority) of dealers take loans to buy their inventory every year. Kid I went to high-school with owns a GMC truck and Nissan dealer in upstate NY. It's a third generation family owned business and he is one of the few that don't take loans out for their inventory. And there is zero difference in the amount of money he makes from selling what's on the lot or if someone orders it. I think he's the largest dealership in NY that doesn't use loans to buy their inventory. His profit margins are higher and can usually get a good deal from him.


Dealerships who borrow money for their inventory is paying interest every month for every vehicle on their lot. The sooner they can sell the vehicle the higher profit they get.


BTW - it's not easy for a dealer to buy their own inventory without taking a loan. To do it they have to build the inventory slowly. Those early years their profit margin will be less, but after a while their profit margins increase. They also are in a better position to wade out the storms (down turns in the economy) then a dealer that needs to take loans for their inventory. We lost several dealerships around here back in 2008.

 

You’re right, there are very few self funding flooring dealerships out there. The majority of dealerships have a flooring line of credit with their captive finance companies, i.e., GMC with GMAC and Nissan with NMAC. But, the advantage they have when doing itthis way is in most cases they get preferential treatment in allocations. For example the zone rep may walk in and say that the manufacturer needs to push some inventory and if you will take another 100 vehicles this month we will either waive the flooring interest or reduce it on these particular vehicles.


But, when it comes to Toyota it’s more about allocations and sales tactics than anything else. Another big factor is that some dealers, actually quite a few, will not transfer holdback money on dealer transfers. That’s why they prefer to divert inventory from the port if possible.takes longer but they make more by doing it this way.


The behind the scenes action in selling a vehicle in inventory is really quite simple compared to what goes on trying to locate one and get it to the dealership.

 

Sorry to hear about that HarleyRider. We had the exact opposite buying from a gully Toyota her in the Houston area. We got the HiHy. It also had to be driven from Yennessee, as I recall since none were available in our area equipped like we wanted. But it was a painless process, no fee, and they also asked ahead of time if the added mileage would be acceptable to us, which it was. But don’t worry about scheduled service if you do buy the one in Chicago yourself. We have ours done at a dealer closer to home and they don’t care where we bought it. In any event it’s a great vehicle ( hence the high demand and being a little hard to find off the lot). You’re going to love it!